Offbeat Offline: November 2025

Welcome to Offbeat Offline, where I bring you up-to-date with what went on in my life during the month just gone, give you a sneak peek of my next shenanigans, and share my favourite posts of late!

(I'm a bit late with my monthly recap this time, but since I was participating in TMST on the 2nd, I didn't want to post two days in a row...).

What happened last month to yours truly? Some routine examinations/visits, a bangs perm, and the cold finally hit in the last 10 days of the month. Copy-paste from last month's recap's intro: my life is still a mess and I can't seem to be able to take the reins. I'm overwhelmed by the ginormous amount of tasks-in-waiting that have gotten so out of hand I don't even know where to start anymore. Wash, rinse, repeat. With that out of the way, let's see which books I got/read/reviewed and what unremarkable shenanigans (for the second month in a row) I was up to in November...

📚 MONTH OF MINIS STRIKES AGAIN. I seem to be looking for all the possible excuses to write mini reviews lately. Even for my 4-star reads, that since I decided to only write mini reviews for certain books, I used to keep reviewing in full. I'm tired, y'all. This is the path of least resistance for me. But I'm still going to write full reviews if I realise I can't rein in my tongue LOL.

Approvals (1+2):

• A (Dead) Thing Like Me by E.G. Young (YA. afterlife; the only real approval of the month)

One hot dog with banana peppers. That’s all Hot Dog wants. An invisible teenage ghost, she haunts a food cart outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Until one night, she’s accidentally summoned via Ouija board to a house party in Florida . . . where finally finally finally, people can see her.

All the party guests scatter, except for Logan: the cool artist girl who doesn’t just see Hot Dog, she actually wants to talk to her. Logan, who isn’t scared of Hot Dog’s stitched mouth or chattering dress. Logan, who’s grieving her own dead BFF—and called Hot Dog by mistake.

Hot Dog wants to prove it’s not a mistake.

She can be Logan’s new best friend. She can go to Logan’s Halloween party. She can eat snacks, have sleepovers, and hang out. She can definitely smile without scaring people. Exactly like a real, human girl.

There’s one problem: Hog Dog’s not a real, living human girl, and something in Logan’s sprawling house knows it. It scratches like rats in the walls. It opens a secret door in Logan’s attic. It wants to drag Hot Dog into the nothingness where dead things go. And unless Hot Dog can confront the dark truth of how she died, it will unmake Logan too.

Gorgeously strange and stunningly written, this YA paranormal masterfully melds camp and creep into a beyond-the-grave coming-of-age.

• Funeral Song by Carly Racklin (Adult, afterlife/mystery - novella; free to download on EW)

In the remote town of Cairney, a gift from the Angel of Death allows the dead to miraculously return to life — after a fashion. For Friede Inkerman, pianist to Cairney’s sacred funerals, Death’s gift is a curse, not a blessing. All she wants after being murdered by her wife and resurrected against her will is to finally rest in peace, free from the grief that ostracizes her from the rest of her death-worshipping town.

On Allhallowsmas, Friede’s hope of passing on to eternal rest is dashed when Death’s gift is stolen and the acolyte who guards it murdered, putting all the dead souls in Cairney at risk of fading into oblivion at sunset. Friede also can’t ignore how much the murder resembles her own.

Clinging to her last happiness, her oldest friend Bastian, Friede races to set things right and see her last wish granted. But Cairney is a town where nothing stays buried, and Friede’s search for answers unearths new horrors that threaten everything she holds dear to her dead heart.

• The Beast You Let In by Dana Mele (YA, supernatural; Read Now on NG) 

There is no one Hazel trusts less than her self-centered twin, Beth. Like when Beth storms out of a party, abandoning Hazel when she didn't want to attend in the first place. Rather than chasing after her, Hazel throws herself into flirting and telling ghost stories over a Ouija board. She might not be the popular twin, but she can be fun too.

Except Beth doesn't come home that night, and Hazel's anger morphs into anxiety. It only sharpens when Beth reappears a day later, disoriented and claiming to be Veronica Green, a teen who was murdered in their small town years before. If it isn't a possession, Beth is really good at faking it. Did they accidentally release a vengeful horror during the party?

Hazel must uncover what happened to Veronica all those years ago if she's going to save Beth. But the truth may destroy them both—if they don't destroy each other first.

Reads (6):

• The Darkness Greeted Her by Christina Ferko (YA, supernatural)

A supernatural twist on the camp-slasher trope with a good dose of heart, a dollop of queer romance, and a believable (if at times simplistic/expedient) approach to trauma and mental health. I wanted more from the characters, but hey, it's a slasher...

• Funeral Song by Carly Racklin (see above)

Such a gothic, sad piece, with an old-fashioned feel (though in this world, gender identities and sexual preferences are never questioned - there's even a NB character). If you're looking for a peculiar afterlife/undead narrative and you don't mind a somehow-open ending (and a gloomy atmosphere, and some graphic body horror), this novella is worth the price of admission.

• The Village at the Edge of Noon by Darya Bobyleva (Adult, fantasy)

Both a slow burn and a somehow episodic tale (for perfectly valid reasons) with strong characterisation, steadily upping the horror/body horror factor along the way and working as social commentary. Recommended for all the folk-horror fans and those looking for a story off the beaten path (in more than one sense...)..

• House of Monstrous Women by Daphne Fama (YA, supernatural)

A slow-burn mix of body/bug horror, cat-and-mouse narrative, sibling conflict and sapphic pining, steeped in Filipino lore/history and set in in an impossible house. Atmospheric and brutal and unexpectedly tender at times, with a final note of hope, though it takes you on a nightmarish journey to end there.

• The Way Up Is Death by Dan Hanks (Adult. sci-fi – reread [pub. 2025])

This book has a lot to say about sexism, celebrity culture, the use of AI, and conversely, grief, morality, mortality and sacrifice, in a way that feels organic to the story and bends its cosmic horror premise in a very human direction. A gentle, yet passionate reminder that we're here to preserve/protect and create a legacy of love, not to exploit and scorch (burn, even) the Earth and the future to satisfy our whims and nurture our prejudices. Here's my old ARC review.

• In Universes by Emet North (Adult. multiverse – reread [pub. 2024])

Original, captivating and genre-encompassing, full of heart and compassion and intelligence and sadness and tenderness and pain - expressed in a poetical, yet fluid and accessible prose - this book reads like a collection of (increasing surreal) short stories with a series of open endings...except in a way it's a single narrative, with a last chapter that does offer closure, all while transcending reality as we know it. OK, don't get scared now, it's a gem. Here's my old review.

Reviews (4):

• The Darkness Greeted Her by Christina Ferko (see above)

Mini review to come later this month.

• Funeral Song by Carly Racklin (see above)

Mini review to come later this month.

• The Village at the Edge of Noon by Darya Bobyleva (see above)

Mini review to come later this month.

• House of Monstrous Women by Daphne Fama (see above)

Mini review on Goodreads for now.

Here are my scheduled reviews for this month:

• The Darkness Greeted Her by Christine Ferko, Funeral Song by Carly Racklin and The Village at the Edge of Noon by Darya Bobyleva (in a mini-review round on Mon. 15th).

Reviews aside, brace yourselves for my 2025 wrap-up on Mon. 22nd - but I'll also participate in the Tell Me Something Tuesday meme on the 9th (question: Which superpower do you wish you had?). In the meantime, here's the TMST prompt list for the rest of December, in case you want to join in:

• Dec 9th: Which superpower do you wish you had? (a question I submitted)
• Dec 16th: Have you been disappointed by the end of a series? If so, did you read that author again?
• Dec 23rd: What's a song that always makes you want to dance?
• Dec 30th: What are your favorite books/audiobooks that you read in 2025?
  

🧺 A BUCKETFUL OF RANDOM THINGS...AGAIN. I went to my usual medical appointments that take place twice a year - ultrasound and hematologist. My CLL is stationary and it doesn't need any kind of treatment yet (it's been 20 years since I was diagnosed, so it's a great track record), but the doctor ordered other examinations, and I'll only have the results later in the month. In other news, I got my bangs repermed, and they did curl - of course now I have a whole lot of straight roots in the rear top that don't match the freshly permed front, but after all my hair issues six months ago, I decided to let them be in order to avoid new drama, with the goal of getting a whole new perm from scratch next May (the bangs usually curl nicely even if I do them twice a year, also because, unlike the lengths, they're short, and they get cut often enough for the old perm to get discarded, mostly...). Hopefully, letting my hair breath will help the new yearly perm to take better for a change...

PUBLISHING NEWS/TIPS

• Tammy lists 26 sci-fi books to read in 2026.

THINK-PIECES, DISCUSSIONS, ORIGINAL FICTION

• Lissa expresses her displeasure about cover stickers.
• Sam discusses anticipated releases.
• The Orangutan Librarian tackles fanfiction, retellings and plagiarism.
• Briana ponders the real meaning of low ratings.
• Ryan has his say about the 100 best comedy movies of all time according to Variety.

REVIEWS/RECOMMENDATIONS

For some reason I didn't bookmark any this month, sorry...😳

OTHER

• In November's school board elections, voters stood with librarians in 27 states.

That's it for now. My next post will be up on December 9th, and it will be the Tell Me Something Tuesday installment I mentioned above.

So, what were your highs/lows in the past month?